A Critical Review of Experimental Research on Hydrogen Fueled SI Engines

Verhelst, Sebastian; Sierens, Roger; Verstraeten, Stefaan

doi:10.4271/2006-01-0430

Cited by 96 publications

(46 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…, open part of the cycle) are very low in comparison to the gross indicated work presented before, due to a WOT operation [46]. According to the measured cylinder pressure history, the pumping losses during the gas exchange period are lower than 2 J for all cases examined in this study.…”

Section: Investigation Of Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 73%

A combined experimental and numerical study of thermal processes, performance and nitric oxide emissions in a hydrogen-fueled spark-ignition engine

Rakopoulos

Kosmadakis

Demuynck

et al. 2011

International Journal of Hydrogen Energy

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A COMBINED EXPERIMENTAL AND NUMERICAL STUDY OF THERMAL PROCESSES, PERFORMANCE AND NITRIC OXIDE EMISSIONS IN A HYDROGEN-FUELED SPARK-IGNITION ENGINE ABSTRACTThis work concerns the study of a spark-ignition engine fueled with hydrogen, using both measured and numerical data at various conditions, focusing on the combustion efficiency, the heat transfer phenomena and heat loss to the cylinder walls, the performance, as well as the nitric oxide (NO) emissions formed, when the fuel/air and compression ratio are varied. For the investigation of the heat transfer mechanism, the local wall temperatures and heat flux rates were measured at three locations of the cylinder liner in a CFR engine. These fluxes can provide a reliable estimation of the total heat loss through the cylinder walls and of the hydrogen flame arrival at specific locations. Together with the experimental analysis, the numerical results obtained from a validated in-house CFD code were utilized for gaining a more complete view of the heat transfer mechanism and the hydrogen combustion efficiency for the various cases examined. The performance of the CFR engine is then identified, since the calculated cylinder pressures are compared with the measured ones, from which performance and heat release rates are calculated and discussed. Further, NO emission studies have been accomplished, with the calculated results not only being compared with the measured exhaust NO ones, but also further processed for conducting an in-depth investigation of the dependence of NO production on the spatial distribution of in-cylinder gas temperature. It is revealed that for lower fuel/air ratio the burned gas temperature is held at low level and the heat loss ratio is quite low. As the load increases and stoichiometric mixtures are used, the wall and in-cylinder gas temperatures increase substantially, together with the heat loss and the NO emissions, owing to the high hydrogen combustion velocity and the consequent high rate of temperature rise. The combustion efficiency is slightly increased, but the indicated efficiency is decreased due to higher heat loss.Keywords: hydrogen; spark-ignition engine; combustion efficiency; heat transfer; NO emissions.

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Section: Investigation Of Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 73%

A combined experimental and numerical study of thermal processes, performance and nitric oxide emissions in a hydrogen-fueled spark-ignition engine

Rakopoulos

Kosmadakis

Demuynck

et al. 2011

International Journal of Hydrogen Energy

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“…A general review of the research done on hydrogen as a fuel for automotive applications up to the mid 90's has been given by Norbeck et al [20]. More recent reviews have been published by White et al [21] and Verhelst et al [22][23]. However, none of these have looked into both Spark Ignition (SI) and Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI), or Controlled Auto-Ignition (CAI), concepts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hydrogen SI and HCCI Combustion in a Direct-Injection Optical Engine

Rosati¹,

Aleiferis²

2009

SAE Int. J. Engines

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The Engineering Meetings Board has approved this paper for publication. It has successfully completed SAE's peer review process under the supervision of the session organizer. This process requires a minimum of three (3) reviews by industry experts. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of SAE. ISSN 0148-7191 Positions and opinions advanced in this paper are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of SAE. The author is solely responsible for the content of the paper. SAE ABSTRACTHydrogen has been largely proposed as a possible alternative fuel for internal combustion engines. Its wide flammability range allows higher engine efficiency with leaner operation than conventional fuels, for both reduced toxic emissions and no CO 2 gases. Independently, Homogenous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) also allows higher thermal efficiency and lower fuel consumption with reduced NO X emissions when compared to Spark-Ignition (SI) engine operation. For HCCI combustion, a mixture of air and fuel is supplied to the cylinder and autoignition occurs from compression; engine is operated throttle-less and load is controlled by the quality of the mixture, avoiding the large fluid-dynamic losses in the intake manifold of SI engines. HCCI can be induced and controlled by varying the mixture temperature, either by Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR) or intake air pre-heating. A combination of HCCI combustion with hydrogen fuelling has great potential for virtually zero CO 2 and NO X emissions. Nevertheless, combustion on such a fast burning fuel with wide flammability limits and high octane number implies many disadvantages, such as control of backfiring and speed of autoignition and there is almost no literature on the subject, particularly in optical engines. Experiments were conducted in a singlecylinder research engine equipped with both Port Fuel Injection (PFI) and Direct Injection (DI) systems running at 1000 RPM. Optical access to in-cylinder phenomena was enabled through an extended piston and optical crown. Combustion images were acquired by a highspeed camera at 1° or 2° crank angle resolution for a series of engine cycles. Spark-ignition tests were initially carried out to benchmark the operation of the engine with hydrogen against gasoline. DI of hydrogen after intake valve closure was found to be preferable in order to overcome problems related to backfiring and air displacement from hydrogen's low density. HCCI combustion of hydrogen was initially enabled by means of a pilot port injection of n-heptane preceding the main direct injection of hydrogen, along with intake air preheating. Sole hydrogen fuelling HCCI was finally achieved and made sustainable, even at the low compression ratio of the optical engine by means of closed-valve DI, in synergy with air-pre-heating and negative valve overlap to promote intern...

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“…Another advantage can be found in the fact that a hydrogen fueled ICE can easily be used as a bi-or flex-fuel engine and can thus be used to avoid the well known "chicken or the egg" dilemma. These benefits and experimental research on hydrogen-fueled ICEs have previously been reviewed by some of the authors [3,4,5].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Starting from a gasoline engine implies port fuel injection (PFI) of the hydrogen. Therefore, this paper concentrates on hydrogen PFI engines, although dedicated hydrogen engines would benefit greatly from direct injection [3,4,11,12] and novel concepts for mixture formation have been reported [13]. Also, work has been published on compression ignition operation on H 2 [14].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The three major bottlenecks are abnormal combustion, performance and NO X output. Although measures can be taken to avoid abnormal combustion (surface ignition, backfire, knock, [3,4,6]), there is no given set of measures with guaranteed success. Backfire (the ignition of the hydrogen-air mixture during the intake process) can be particularly difficult to predict and is thus the most difficult to control [7].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Impact of variable valve timing on power, emissions and backfire of a bi-fuel hydrogen/gasoline engine

Verhelst

Demuynck

Sierens

et al. 2010

International Journal of Hydrogen Energy

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Hydrogen-fueled internal combustion engines are a possible solution to make transportation more ecological.Apart from difficulties in production and storage of hydrogen, there are three major bottlenecks in the operation of hydrogen powered engines: reaching a high power output, reducing NO x emissions at high loads and avoiding backfire. This paper presents an experimental study of the influence of continuously variable valve timing of the intake valves on these bottlenecks. Measurements were performed on a four-cylinder engine that can run on gasoline as well as on hydrogen. The measurements on hydrogen are compared to those on gasoline. For hydrogen, the effects of the cam phasing were investigated at wide open throttle, where load is controlled by the quality of the mixture (equivalence ratio) as well as in throttled mode, where load is defined by the quantity of mixture.Results show that it is possible to optimize the applied control strategy by using variable valve timing as a means to increase the range of both the qualitative and quantitative load control methods, which contributes to an easier switch between both methods.

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A Critical Review of Experimental Research on Hydrogen Fueled SI Engines

Cited by 96 publications

References 42 publications

A combined experimental and numerical study of thermal processes, performance and nitric oxide emissions in a hydrogen-fueled spark-ignition engine

A combined experimental and numerical study of thermal processes, performance and nitric oxide emissions in a hydrogen-fueled spark-ignition engine

Hydrogen SI and HCCI Combustion in a Direct-Injection Optical Engine

Impact of variable valve timing on power, emissions and backfire of a bi-fuel hydrogen/gasoline engine

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